Agora Media Group Innovation Blog

by Gianluigi Cuccureddu and Richard Kastelein.

That’s right.  Unbelievable. Even to us.  And it only cost us sweat. Making sure the copy was interesting and well written. Making sure we took a little extra time to tweet and retweet. Making sure we pushed it to Reddit and Digg. Making sure we used Facebook and Linkedin as well to disseminate our ideas to our friends and business partners.

Scroll down to the very bottom of this page and see the dynamic PR ranking.

A check three weeks ago, delivered us a marvelous sign that we are doing well with the Agora Media Group blog. After the Agora Media’s own Social Media case -> 16000% growth we pushed further in order to expand our visibility and expertise.

Corporate Blogging and an attached Social Media strategy to get our opinions and analyses out is practically the only Marketing we did to get the word out of the Agora Media Group.
Surely PageRank is not the most important metric, but what it does tell is that we’re linked back from important sites.

We achieved this by applying the Social Media Framework which we wrote about. In essence it’s about the Content, Context and Social Media Intelligence which enhances both Content and Context.

Content * Context * Social Media Intelligence = Powerful Social Media

The last week much has already been written about the possible acquisition of ITA by Google.

As mentioned on Bloomberg:

“Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information, and ITA does that for travel,” said Henry Harteveldt, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc. in San Francisco.

With this mission comes their advertising model, adding ITA’s will enhance the travel information they can provide users.
Increased relevance for the users means higher earnings for Google due to the higher costs which are paid by advertisers.
Google has five times more search volume than Bing has in the US, with the addition of ITA’s software, quality can increase due to the enhanced search and buying experience.
Bloomberg Businessweek reports:

With tools that help users find flight information online, ITA Software may help Google compete with travel-search features offered by Microsoft. The companies are tussling for share in the U.S. market for online travel, which generated $88.4 billion in sales last year, according to Sherman, Connecticut travel consulting firm PhoCusWright Inc.

One of the most sophisticated travel-search features offered by Microsoft is the Farecast technology which is the basis of Bing Travel.

From the customer point of perspective it all sounds pretty logical and fine, who wouldn’t want a shorter buying journey?
Though from the B2B point of view, it’s a different story, hence my initial question.
Google would not only intermingle with the offline agents, but as well with their online equivalents, the OTAs. The ultimate “direct” supplier has signed in.
As mentioned by this analyst:

Since the GDS power both of those channels, there would most certainly be a major impact to their transaction volume for air ticket sales, which is what drives their business model.

If Google is able to kill two birds with one stone, namely further disintermediation of the travel supply chain and a higher search share from Microsoft (and others), it has a potential winner.
This will go accompanied by power shifts in both the industries (Search and Travel), how do you think they will respond?
What’s your general opinion on this possible acquisition?

by Gianluigi Cuccureddu & Richard Kastelein

Yes, what it will do at least, is shake up the TV industry and get them out of their “Walled Gardens”, and actively look for business model innovations.  Google has the potential, reach and money to penetrate the market with more than just a shake up. It will likely be cataclysmic… and they will truly launch the concept of Social and Connected TV into the Zeitgeist by 2011.

The rumour mill has once again ground out another flutter of gossip about Google going into the TV market – but still – nobody will go on record. This time it’s about when they will release their official foray into this space.

The Wall Street Journal wrote that:

Google Inc. is planning to introduce Android-based television software to developers at an event in May, according to people familiar with the matter.

Google is headhunting for developers in this space, which validates the buzz.

Android and Chrome both have substantial development communities, but it will likely take some time before investments are made from software developers – and it will come when Google can show a critical mass adaption. Until now, Yahoo Connected TV has been leading in this space, but interest in their Widget Development Kit (WDK) is rather tepid. Google TV’s future development kit (likely based on Android and Chrome),  won’t likely be wide open, but will surely be more flexible and malleable than Yahoo’s.

But other news on Google TV recently came with a report from the  Korean Herald,  who published an article about a possible marriage between the world’s leading TV manufacturer, Samsung, and Google TV. In other words, Samsung, who is already tied to Yahoo Connected TV is considering cutting another deal with Google and building CE devices with Android architecture.

Yahoo won’t be happy if this pans out – but they don’t seem to be able to develop much traction in attracting developers to this space, nor creating enough buzz about Social TV, TV Apps, Widgets etc.

Will hardware manufacturers lose their control? They might, if they don’t play ball, Google just might start producing TV’s themselves.

According to a quote from the same Korean Herald article

Chun Seung-hoon, an analyst at Eugene Investment & Securities, said Samsung’s Google TV is plausible, given that Google’s Android is an open platform. “There is no problem for Samsung to produce Google TVs,” he said. However, he said the hardware manufacturer faces the risk of losing its control over the TV market to Google, a software firm, should it make Google TVs. “This is not a good picture. I think it would be better for Samsung to expand its own platform Bada,“ he said.

Google’s perspective is from the software side, manufacturers is from the hardware perspective, and a complementary growth strategy for both sides is more plausible.

Expansion of its own mobile development platform Bada – Samsung could perhaps itself  head towards their own Social TV development and make a play for both a two screen and one screen experience.  People’s demand in the end is what will make or break a Walled Garden, in this case Bada, which already has an ample app store.

Already mentioned in one of my earlier analysis Television 2.0’s foremost challenge is… , consumer control and attention are essential in understanding the coming paradigm TV shift.

In the end, all that people want is any content at their time, on their screen when they’re in the mood. Creating a battle between open systems, from any kind of manufacturer, is a risk for growth strategies and revenue streams.

Going from the platform to the actual content consumption which will be enabled by Google Android TV, it will be interesting to see how this will develop and evolve.
On NewTeeVee, researcher Marie-José Montpetit at MIT’s Research Lab for Electronics, says that Social TV doesn’t mean a cluttering of content and widgets on the TV screen.

Google has the resources to analyse this in-depth, create understanding how the new television experience could be enhanced in appropriate ways, not a simple centralisation of different content on a screen.

There’s more than enough landscape on the next generation of TV’s to allow for optional widgets to be popped in and out, and if sized correctly,  a single screen experience can work. The widgets, from a design perspective, can and should be optional and can and should be designed to be part of the overall TV experience, if planned well. If they can get the Interactive Design down pat – getting ‘social’ on one screen can work. There are many examples of websites that have this kind of alternative.  Our blog has an optional widget for Twitter that can be pulled out and retracted quite nicely 0n the bottom right.

Here again the ultimate quest is to provide users control to gain their attention which will lead to -new- revenue models.

Apps/Widgets have been said to be the new Cash Cow generators for the digitized ubiquity, the syndication of content and the consumption of it. If Google and the industry will be able to go forth in the evolution of television and the experience, conventional revenue models could be proven not to be the only valid ones.

What do you think, will Google be able to get movement in this cumbersome sector?

Just after having written The super power of Word-of-Mouth Marketing post, Forrester analysts Josh Bernoff and Augie Ray presented statistics on the state of Word of Mouth Marketing.

A summary of the presentation can be read on Mashable, where it also explains the three different Word of Mouth Influencers.
In the so-called Peer Influence Pyramid the Social Broadcasters (at the top), Mass Influencers (middle), and Potential Influencers (bottom of the pyramid) define the three types of Influencers which, as a brand, you need to take into account. First to understand the dynamics how these three types of Influencers spread messages and influence.
Secondly, the create and reach the best as possible these three types in order to address all three.

The article further reports that people are making a staggering 500 billion influence impressions on one another. This is massive, business-driven advertising and influence is being challenged by these outside influences which bypass the brand but talk about that specific brand.
Why?
Because the Web is transparent, it centralizes content which has effect that in increases the influence of comments, ratings and such, much more than the offline equivalent Word of Mouth messages. These are fragmented and not “eternalized”. The Potential Influencers are the group of people where the real trust can be found. It’s also the largest portion of people. Exactly this group of Influencers can create a chain reaction, triggering friends’ friends and further on.

Mashable ends with

In summary, Bernoff and Ray’s advice to marketers includes:

Build a strategy for reaching all three types of influencers.

Allocate your budget in light of a potential 500 billion impressions of peer influence.

Analyze and reach out to your mass influencers specifically for maximum reach.

To make a step back, before building a strategy, reach mass influencers and allocate budget, brands first need to identify their Influencers. Without the identification, it’s harder to effectively reach and empower them.

What do you think of the Peer Influence Pyramid, are there types of Influencers that miss?

Picked up this news from the LA Times blog.

It is not confirmed yet, but the blog mentions an subscription service of $9.95

“[...] according to people with knowledge of the plans.“

The subscription service should start on the 24th of May. Viewers will still be able to view the first couple of shows for free, but for additional shows needs to be paid.
At the end of the article, the mentioning of

“Ultimately, Hulu is expected to adopt the same commercial loads as network television.”

is interesting, because one of the differentiators is the load of commercials. If this will be within the same amounts of network televisions, a Hulu and other streaming video platforms need to position and gain an unique advantage through Content, social aspects etc. Of course syndication their content to devices like the iPhone and iPad could add value to their proposition as well.

Would you pay $9.95 to access a more comprehensive collection on Hulu?
What do you think of the advertising plans similar to existing television networks, are there other revenue models which generate the same or more and be less disruptive?

Yesterday I read an article on McKinsey Quarterly on a new way to measure Word-of-Mouth Marketing.
The Word-of-Mouth Equity as they call it is an interesting equation to further explore. Besides the quantification of Word-of-Mouth, the overall development and importancy pointed out by McKinsey is well explained.

There are Word-of-Mouth three forms marketers need to understand: Experiential, Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth.
The Experiential is the true C2C marketing, whereas Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth is a B2C2C marketing, where Word-of-Mouth is being orchestrated and promoted by the company in order to trigger their target group(s) for further viral the C2C distribution.

The Experiential Word-of-Mouth is the most powerful and trusted form, because it’s a direct experience of the product/service by the person, which then is being positively or negatively recommended. If it’s positive or negative depends on the gap between the expectation and experience of the product or service.
Here the thorough understanding must be present that Experiential Word-of-Mouth is forcing a paradigm shift in brand experience, it is what your target audience think your brand is, instead of a push perceivement.

The shift from a produced influence -solely- created by the company to a prosumerist or co-creational or even customer-driven influence can be seen clear in the image below:

A couple of points stand out in the image:

* In a developing market, Word-of-Mouth is the most powerful influencer in the customer decision journey. This has the advantage that the innovators and early adopters do act as evangelists, which trigger their peers to show similar behavior. The second advantage is that Word-of-Mouth is relatively cheaper than advertising tactics, being able to achieve a better margin or lower overall costs in the introduction phases.
Extensive information is not yet available, forcing consumers to rely faster on each other.
* In the mature market, Word-of-Mouth is less influential, this has part to do with the transforming market, also because advertising in mature markets and later phases in product life cycles require lots of advertising and other still “conventional” tactics to be able to compete in the mature market. It could be well that proportionally there were much more advertising touch points with the target audiences than the consumers amongst them, creating a lower percentage which blur results.

The second image below is the equation by McKinsey which shows an interesting perspective which can be applied to understand better how Word-of-Mouth impacts the brand and the causes, be it on any kind of device or channel, which I will elaborate later on.

Because media convergence is rigidly diffusing amongst (mobile) devices, companies need to overthink tactics twice before executing them, the power of consumers is huge, the hyperconnective society is updated nearly in real-time, making the companies vulnerable when actions are not well thought.
The Volume and Impact equals the Word-of-Mouth Equity.
The Impact is determined by four aspects, Network, Sender, Message Content and Message Source.
The Volume is of importance with regard to the reach per message, but it doesn’t determine the quality of the reach. From an utopian one-on-one marketing point of perspective, the smaller the reach is, but the better the quality is, due to personalized or relevant alignment between Sender, Message and Receiver.

Why is it important to understand the impact on media convergence?
Because it offers many opportunities for companies to granulate content (in the Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth) to create a most effective trigger for their consumers per touch point, per channel.
Online communities grow, vertical networks with highly specialized topics and followers do grow.
Networks become interoperable, devices become interoperable, content can be requested via mobile, laptop, TV and iPad, “small” is relative and the impact is and will be forceful.

The advent of Social TV is only going to increase the power of Word-of-Mouth Marketing to new levels, creating new opportunities and challenging companies at the same time to understand, yet another channel used by consumers.
Think of what will happen if TV widgets (Twitter, Facebook and others) will enable real-time direct communication with their network to comment on the content which is being broadcasted?
Advertising, product placements, concepts, lots will be subject to consumer influence, instantly.

I do think the Word-of-Mouth Equity is worth the try in understanding what kind of messages will impact the brand more than others.
What’s your opinion on Word-of-Mouth Marketing?
Is the equation one that you would experiment with in understanding the dynamics of Word-of-Mouth?

I came across a new patent which is filed by Apple on PatentlyApple.com.

It describes in detail what Apple how Apple is planning to revolutionize the current ticketing process, plus enhancing the event experience itself.
For further details, have a look at the article on PatentlyApple.com.

For me, two immediate questions arise.

Is Apple trying to smartly achieve a kind of All-you-need-is-the-iPhone state?
By centralizing processes and ascribing them to this device, a powerfull influence is created for the iPhone. Surely iTunes and it’s music is part of this move, but the centralized modus for the iPhone can of course be expanded to many other purposes as well.

Secondly, based on Porter’s Five Forces model, what will the impact be if Apple enters this business?
It certainly will put emphasis on the entry of a new player and the threat of substitute products/services. The patent refers to giving access to live recordings of the concert which visitors just attended or access to exclusive interviews. Who wouldn’t want this? It’s all additional and easy to access content, this will have consequences for other ticketing businesses who can’t offer this.
iTunes is a platform used by many, the bargaining power of customers will increase due to its innovative approach, raising the current intensity amongst existing players to outsmart Apple and “conventional” ticketing business.

Do you think the iPhone becomes the all-in-one-device?
If this will happen, how do you see the future or developments of the ticketing industry?

Interesting to have read the news that Boxee is looking for a Lead iPad and iPhone App Developer.
Their starting point is that they “consider ‘other screens’ as important as TVs for enjoying video.”
Signs of a furthering media convergent consumption continues.

I’m interested in seeing if and how they will differentiate the iPhone and iPad application in comparison to their television application. The iPhone screen isn’t too big, this might devaluate the watching experience. Maybe the focus of the iPhone application has a more social focus, whereas the iPad is a great substitution for the television screen?

What do you think the distinction between television, mobile and tablet will be?

For those who don’t know Boxee, check out this video taken from their website:

Almost a year passed by since I wrote The 3 Fundaments of Online Strategy.
Since then much has rapidly evolved, ubiquity is becoming a new standard.
New media devices are being released which expands the amount of channels and touch points for consumers. This challenges companies on a fast pace, keeping up with (technical/cultural) developments in order to offer that what consumers demand.

Emphasis must be put on mobile devices and how they change and add value to the marketing strategy.
The Online Strategy extends from the computer to all sorts of mobile devices which are being increasingly used in daily lives.

Every screen consists an application of its own three fundaments, moulding it in an integral marketing strategy.
The key is not to copy, but apply those aspects which fit the device and purpose/usage by user. Sometimes it means that it won’t be implemented, sometimes it does.

A good example is Linkedin. There’s a huge difference in purpose and final execution when you look at the “desktop” website and the iPhone app.
Another example is Lonely Planet, rapidly expanding its media exposure to the iPhone and iPad, it aren’t copies of their books or their core website. Both are well adapted products to the needs of the users in relation to the -mobile- device.
The company goes further though, it introduced as well the Lonely Planet Compass guides, an Augmented Reality application, again for the mobile device but with another purpose. The Compass Guides are a good example of the power and relevance of Location Based Services, it will grow in importance when we take into account the key mobile trend and technical pre-conditions by Morgan Stanley.
Last but not least, don’t underestimate the rise of Social TV, an extra screen to reach your target groups.

When the expanded functional strategy is formulated, be sure to evaluate your strategic options against Johnson and Scholes’ model of success criteria (Suitability, Feasibility, Acceptibility).
To reference to the hype around Social Media, jumping the bandwagon just because others do, is not based on strategic decision-making and it could harm the brand and corporate strategy overall.
It’s important to understand that this is just the beginning of mobile and understanding the effect on growth strategies and opportunities is a first step.

What’s your opinion on the expanding amount of channels and -possible- touch points with your target groups?

The relatively new Streaming API by Twitter makes it possible to achieve the following (taken from the Twitter blog):

• You’re visualizing tweets in real-time online or on-air.
• You want to present tweets in a continuously-refreshing experience, e.g, you want to broadcast new NCAA basketball tweets as they’re created.
• You’re following a specific group of users in real-time, e.g. a group of reporters.
• You want to capture a very large number of tweets for analysis (either real-time or after-the-fact), e.g. all the tweets about a State of the Union address.

These are interesting applications which can and will have impact on TV formats and concepts. Real-time integration of User Generated Content (UGC) into the TV content.

In the further integration of TV and Web, Twitter has been tested more than once in bridging the two, think of TV Chatter and Chitter.tv, both are efforts and learning curves in order to understand relationships between the two and how people consume their content.
Another interesting effort is Twision, the Spanish Twitter driven TV show. Have a look at the video (Spanish spoken) to have an idea how the concept works.

Both have different approaches and will benefit by the Streaming API opportunities.

What are the different approaches?
TV Chatter and Chitter.tv are sites which bundle tweets/UGC around other content. A network of information is created and displayed around the broadcast.
Twision on the other hand goes further in its integration of co-creational efforts. In this program, viewers co-create with the presentators the content which is real-time broadcasted.

I have tested both TV Chatter and Chitter.tv, and the distribution of attention between the broadcast and the network tweeting around it, makes it difficult to follow both.
The two require attention in order to be fully experienced and understood. I got the feeling that the television was on the “background” in a kind of multitasking way where the served Web content was the primary focus.

However the TV Chatters’ are solutions “in between” and easier, for an integral experience of TV and Web, Twision formats are the future. Not only format- and technology-wise, but more importantly, from a prosumerist and co-creational concept. To create a near real-time experience, the power of the Streaming API willl add its value.

Regarding the last point, capturing tweets for analysis, could prove itself to be an important addition to Social Network Analysis (SNA), real-time uncovering patterns and relationships.
Besides the insights and knowledge acquirement, this kind of UGC can be moulded into a business model, able to be accessed by companies to learn more about their target groups and further granulate marketing efforts.
It can be a revenue stream for Twitter, in a partnership model or otherwise.

What do you think of the Streaming API and its possible effect on TV?